WANTED: LAWYERS FOR ENVIRONMENT
Nov 23, 2005
Updated 10:22pm (Mla time)
Delfin Mallari Jr.
Inquirer News Service
Raul Zapatos, a former forest guard based in Bayugan, Agusan del Sur. Jose Fabrique, a former police officer in Sibuyan, Romblon. Julio Versoza, a government forest ranger assigned to guard the Mt. Isarog Natural Park in Camarines Sur. Rolando Rey Recto, a councilor in Buenavista, Quezon. They come from different areas of the country but share life stories of courage as zealous defenders of Mother Earth’s fragile environment. Because of their commitment, they have been harassed, coerced and marked for liquidation by people behind the rape of nature’s wealth in their places. Their stories were told before participants of a recent three-day Luzon-wide conference on environmental paralegal and law enforcement in a resort hotel in Tayabas, Quezon .
More than 90 paralegal, community and law enforcers from the Department of Environment and Natural Resources narrated experiences of joy and pain in protecting the environment. The event was sponsored by Tanggol Kalikasan (Defense of Nature), a public interest environmental legal defense center, and the Foundation for the Philippine Environment. It was co-funded by the Ford Foundation and the Center for International Environmental Law-US Agency for International Development. “We thought of this conference for environmental paralegal and law enforcers because of increasing challenges and problems hurled against them, including cases of harassment, physical violence, demotion, transfer, marginalization and the like. Perhaps, we can find solutions to their problems,” said environmental lawyer Asis Perez, TK executive director.
Perez said some of the problems and issues on environmental protection had already been identified but his group wanted the people directly involved to relate their own stories, pains and woes, and the lessons they learned. “We want to validate our findings,” he said. The TK, manned by a pool of environmental lawyers and paralegals, has been operating for 17 years, with offices in strategic parts of the country. When the participants began telling their stories, the whole assembly listened.
Behind bars
Zapatos spent four and a half years behind bars for strictly enforcing anti-illegal logging laws, which led to the killing of their mayor, Leonardo Cortes, on Jan. 14, 1990. That night, unidentified men rained bullets on the DENR checkpoint that Zapatos and other forest guards were manning. Earlier, the group had seized a truck loaded with illegally cut logs. Zapatos immediately grabbed an Armalite rifle and fired back at the attackers, not knowing that he had fatally hit the mayor, the truck owner. His case caught international attention and he was hailed as another icon of environmental protection. Environmentalist groups across the globe campaigned for his release from jail. In September 2003, the Supreme Court reversed the decision of the Sandiganbayan and set Zapatos free.
Fabrique used to be with the Sibuyan, Romblon police force, with a rank of Senior Police Officer 3. “When I arrived in Sibuyan, the first thing I noticed was the impressive thick forest of Mt. Giting-Giting. I swore to myself I would protect it,” Fabrique narrated. He was disappointed when he learned that local officials and policemen were behind the illegal logging activities in the mountain. Undaunted by the risk to his safety and profession, he launched a crusade to strictly enforce environmental laws. “Because of mounting harassment against me, I refused to report [for work] and was classified as an Awol (absent without official leave). I was terminated. But I explained my reason, I filed a complaint and I was vindicated,” Fabrique said.
Forest ranger
Versoza is a DENR forest ranger assigned to the Mt. Isarog Natural Park, a vital watershed in Camarines Sur. The area is the source of drinking water of 15 municipalities and one city and irrigates about 67,400 hectares of farmlands, aside from being the habitat of several indigenous flora and fauna species. But like other mountains, Isarog faces problems of slash-and-burn farming, wildlife hunting, illegal logging and treasure hunting. The perennial hunt for the fabled Yamashita treasure proved to be the major threat to the mountain, and Versoza blamed a local judge for some of the activities. Harassed with lawsuits by the judges, Versoza landed at the Ocampo municipal jail for robbery charges of spurious circumstances.
For Recto, the young municipal councilor, the presence of gold in their town and his advocacy to prevent the damaging effects of mining to the environment forced him to live in fear. Recto said he learned that his enemies had been planning to liquidate him.
Support
According to a TK study conducted by lawyer Ma. Ronely Sheen, the government has done little to enforce its environmental policy because of the lack of knowledge of enforcers and the slow judicial process. The bigger irony is the inadequate legal support for environmental protectors, volunteers and state workers, the study said. “Anecdotal information is replete with examples of enforcers who have been harassed with lawsuits and bodily harmed for enforcing environmental laws. Also, due to the shortage of lawyers in the government, these law enforcers are often constrained to hire private lawyers for their own defense,” the TK report added. The study found that the failure to prosecute violators was primarily due to the lack of lawyers in local DENR offices. “Legal assistance is sometimes limited to affidavit preparation only. No proper safekeeping of material evidence. Sometimes, evidence is lost in transit or is stolen while in the custody of the DENR,” it said. Sheen lamented that the pathetic government attitude toward implementing environmental laws had resulted in serious demoralization among the ranks of state environmental protection enforcers. “They lose their enthusiasm, they feel helpless and useless. It ruins their credibility. They now have the tendency to be lax in law enforcement,” she said. Some are totally dismayed and lose interest in filing or pursuing the case against the violators, knowing that harassment suits, in return, could deny them promotions, loans and retirement benefits—aside from being barred from traveling abroad, Sheen said.
Logistics
Zapatos, who now works as property custodian at the DENR regional office in Cagayan de Oro City, has learned his lesson. He advised the department to have a ready and adequate fund to shoulder the cost of forest protection. “Sad to admit, government support in this aspect of environmental protection is wanting,” he added. He lamented that the DENR was not able to assist him in his legal defense. He was grateful to his co-workers who shelled out money for his bail. “The rest of my legal defense costs—bail money, lawyer’s fees, etc.—came from my personal fund,” Zapatos said. “My fellow rangers were demoralized with the DENR neglect of my case. I was like a beggar then, asking for every centavo to fund my court battle,” he recalled. The only financial assistance he received from the department, according to Zapatos, was a pledge by then Environment Secretary Heherson Alvarez to compensate him P50,000 for every year of his incarceration. He said he received the allotted amount for 2001 and 2002 only.
Zapatos also believed that forest rangers must be armed for their protection. “Without a gun, a forest ranger is an easy target for intimidation while performing his duty,” he said. He clarified that the rifle he used in shooting back at the illegal loggers belonged to an Army soldier who left it in the barracks that fateful night.
Few lawyers
Perez said the inputs of the conference were discussed in a meeting of lawyers. “We aim to build a network of reputable trial lawyers to defend environmental defenders who may be threatened or harassed with court cases for doing their duty as environmental law enforcers,” he explained. The TK has a pool of only five lawyers, he said. He estimated that only 20 lawyers were part of the legal network on environmental protection advocacy in the country. “We believe that there are more individual practitioners of environmental lawyering who are not yet part of the network. We should pull them in,” Perez said.
The DENR has signed a memorandum of agreement with the Washington-based Center for International Environmental Law and the TK for the formation of a pool of lawyers who would serve as legal defenders of government personnel and volunteers who are subjected to legal harassment for enforcing environmental laws.
The project is called “Defending the Defenders Project.”
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